Sunday, 7 June 2009

7 Jun 09 - Airport and back

17 nautical miles

This was a day cruise with Sean, Ronan and Kara... so it depended on the direction of the wind where we went to. The wind meant we could have a beat up towards the airport and a broad reach followed by a downwind run back. And I forgot to take any photos.

Today was races at the club. It had originally been Monday for the races, but was changed to Sunday. Tomorrow will be the regatta.

We got down to the club by 9:30 to be out on the water and away from the racing space before they started. In fact I motored out for a cable or so to get quickly out of the way. The wind was light, Bft 3-4 all day which made for a gentle enjoyable cruise. Sean also has his day skipper so we split the helming between us and let the kids have a go too.

There were a couple of inconsiderate power boats that passed us about 50 metres away at high speed. I suppose we should be thankful that they did give way to us at all, but causing a 1 metre bow wave for us to climb over was pretty unnecessary as if they had passed further away it would not have been such a wave and reducing speed would only have cost them a few seconds. Oh well...

We hove to a couple of times - once for a 'bucket and chuck it' break and once for lunch. As we were approaching the airport a 747 came right over head. We were approx 3/4 nautical mile from the end of the runway and didn't get any significant jetwash, so I wonder how close you would have to be to be dangerous. Not covered in the Day Skipper Course!

The broad reach followed by down wind run was good fun and enjoyable. We then gybed out of it into a beam reach back to the club. Was pleased with the gybe out of it - it was a textbook smooth gybe while bringing in the whisker pole at the same time. I suppose having two Day Skippers on the boat, so it should be!

Only issue, one of the snap shackles holding the masthead buoyancy up has lost its spring so it no longer works. Will have to replace that.